The Shap Avenues

Dr Stukeley, writing about the middle of the last century, says: " At the south side of the town of Shap we saw the beginning of a great Celtic avenue on a green common; this avenue is 70 feet broad, composed of very large stones set at equal intervals; it seems to be closed at this end, which is on an eminence and near a long flattish barrow with stone works upon it, hence it proceeds northward to the town, which intercepts the continuation of it and was the occasion of its ruin, for manyo f the stones are put under the foundations of walls and houses, being pushed by machines they call a 'betty,' or blown up with gunpowder; . . . houses and fields lie across the track of this avenue, and some of the houses lie in the enclosure; it ascends a hill, crosses the common road to Penrith and so goes into the cornfields on the other side of the way westward, where some stones are left standing, one particularly remarkable, called the 'Guggleby' stone. . . I guess by the crebrity [sic] and number of the stones remaining there must have been 200 on a side...